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Monday, November 30, 2015

Hi there! We had a busy weekend so I didn't get into the Craft Cave at all. Mom and I had a girls' day out on Saturday and did some Christmas shopping. On Sunday Luis and I took a couple of leisurely walks with Tex and gave him a bath. We also continued with clearing out the house now that the interior painting is almost done (only the bathroom left). Since we had to move everything to paint I was determined not to just shove it all back where it came from. We've done major culling of everything from clothes to pantry items to general "stuff". I've even let go of some books!! With each trip to the dump or charity shop I feel a little bit lighter. We've been watching a lot of these TV programs about tiny houses and, while I don't think I could handle living in 400 square feet, I like the idea of paring down our belongings to a more streamlined amount. (Before you even ask, no - I have not done this in the Craft Cave yet! Baby steps...)

Skipping Stones Design stamps are not required to play along but if you have some we'd love to see you use them.

I tend not to use a lot of snow related images since there is never any snow here but I could not resist the Sassy Snow set with it's cute images and cheeky sentiments. This one in particular always cracks me up. :) I paper pieced my snow gal with Bo Bunny papers and mounted the panel against some snow flurries. I went for an orange sentiment to really allow it and the nose to pop!

I hope you'll find some time to play along with us especially as one lucky person will win a Skipping Stones Design stamp set of their choice. Be sure to check out the rest of the gorgeous inspiration from the design team and then play along!

Tuesday, November 24, 2015

Welcome to Week 174 of CASology! Take a look at the cue word for this week:

Owls continue to be one of the more popular critters in the world of card making. They're not quite at the level of butterflies but they're certainly up there (along with foxes). I found a number of owl images in my stash from several different companies but I finally settled on using this one from (the sadly defunct) My Cute Stamps. I used the sentiment to create the branch and paper pieced the owl and leaves. Be sure to check out the rest of the

Monday, November 23, 2015

Hi there! I've got another card to share from the ones I made yesterday. This one is for three challenges. I used the sketch from CAS(E) This Sketch as my starting point and paper pieced these adorable Lawn Fawn birdies. I added some clear Wink of Stella to their green winter wear but otherwise kept it super simple. Plus I added another brightly coloured card to my stash! Yay! I'm also going to play along with the AAA Cards Anything Goes challenge and the CAS on Sunday Christmas challenge.

Sunday, November 22, 2015

Luis was out with the boys today so I made it into the Craft Cave today for the first time in a week. I managed to get a few cards put together and am going to share two of them tonight. This first one was inspired by the current ColourQ palette and photo. I finally broke open this gorgeous WPlus9 Woodland Wreaths set to make this clean and layered card. I added clear Wink of Stella to all the berries for lots of sparkle. I'm also going to enter this in the Simon Says Wednesday Christmas challenge and the Addicted to Stamps And More Anything Goes challenge.

My next card uses the sketch (a very pared down interpretation of it perhaps!) and the thankful theme from The Friday Mash-Up. I used a flower and a sentiment from older, neglected Lawn Fawn sets so I'm also entering this in the Lawnscaping In With the Old challenge. I'm trying to make an effort to create more cards with coloured card bases so that I can jazz up my card stand a little bit. I've been making lots of super CAS cards lately so I feel like I need to inject some colour to grab people's attention.

Tuesday, November 17, 2015

Welcome to Week 173 of CASology! Take a look at the cue word for this week:

Cas-ual Fridays saved the day again for me when looking for a sentiment this week. I found two in my CF collection but decided to go with this one and I paired it up with a Hero Arts rainbow and cloud. I attempted to paper piece the rainbow but it went very badly so I broke down and used my Copics to color it. Thankfully, it was pretty hard to go wrong with this image! Be sure to visit the rest of the design team for some gorgeous inspiration and then play along with us!

Saturday, November 14, 2015

Hi there! I'm excited today to take part in my first Tip/Technique Blog Hop as part of theSkipping Stones Design Team. Each team member will share a card along with a tip or technique for designing or even organization.

I have a couple of tips in regards to this card. When I'm having trouble coming up with a design idea I'll sometimes flip through my 6x6 patterned paper pads and see if anything sparks my interest. I found this adorable sky with doily clouds and immediately thought of the hot air balloons from the Uplifting set. I'm not the most confident when it comes to coloring so I tend to do a lot of paper piecing just like I did here with the balloons. My #1 tip for paper piecing is to outline your images with a black marker once you've cut them out. It helps to provide a crisp edge that allows the images to really pop. The sentiment is taken from Heartsong 2.

Be sure to visit everyone along the hop and leave some love as one lucky commenter will win a stamp set. Why not have a browse in the Skipping Stones Design Store too - just in case you're the lucky winner! ;)

Thursday, November 12, 2015

Hi there! I have two cards to share with you this afternoon. First up is a card for The Paper Players colour challenge to use black and white plus silver or gold and one other colour. I used an NBUS Neat & Tangled stamp and I tried out some glitter finish embossing powder from American Crafts. The card is far more sparkly in real life than in the picture but that's par for the course I'm afraid!

Supplies Used:

Cardstock: (White) Papertrey Ink, (Real Red, BasicBlack) Stamipin' Up

Stamps: (Warm Wishes) Neat & Tangled

Inks: (VersaMark) Tsukineko

Embossing Powder: (Zing Gold Glitter Finish) America Crafts

Next is a card for the Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers K is for Kitties challenge. Conveniently, I had to make a cat themed card for a client so I have an entry however, I have some other actual snarky ideas and am hoping to get some time to make one or two of them tomorrow. We'll see. I have to take Mr. Tex to the vet at lunch time as he is itching like mad. No fleas - seems to be a skin issue. Poor guy is going nuts! Anyway that's it for now. Time to head out in the wind and rain to take care of the kitties. (Cue world's smallest violin). :D Have a lovely evening!

Supplies Used:

Cardstock: (White) Papertrey Ink

Patterned Paper: (Hello Again 6x6) Echo Park

Stamps: (Have a purrfect from Nine Lives, Birthday from Party Posse) Paper Smooches

Tuesday, November 10, 2015

Welcome to Week 172 of CASology! Take a look at the cue word for this week:

I've gone super CAS for this week's card. I knew I had this sentiment but couldn't remember which stamp company it was from so I spent ages combing through all of my sets trying to find it. It's actually a good thing to do once in a while since it reminds me of what I have and sparks lots of ideas. I just need to do it when I have more time on my hands! Anyway I paired the CAS-ual Fridays sentiment with a Paper Smooches butterfly, added some gems and that was it! Be sure and check out the inspiration from the design team and then play along with us!

Monday, November 9, 2015

Hi there! I'm popping in with a card for the current Time Out challenge - Christmas with the optional twist of using pink and/or purple. I finally put my Reverse Confetti trees to use. They were everywhere last year and I loved them so I finally got them for this year. Better late than never right? I used a combination of patterned papers from Authentique and Lawn Fawn for the trees and banners and added a few gems to finish it off. Fun and funky! Time to jet back off to work now. I'll see you here tomorrow for CASology!

Sunday, November 8, 2015

Hi there! I have a quartet of cards to share today for 9 different challenges so I'm going to get straight into it. First up is a card for the Addicted to Stamps and More CAS challenge using the sketch from Freshly Made Sketches. I used some NBUS Altenew Christmas stamps and paper pieced them with coloured cardstock. The poinsettia is layered 3 times and has lots of dimension in real life.

This card uses the neutral colour scheme from Colour Me along with the Hardware challenge over at The Male Room. I used Delicata Golden Glitz ink for the Altenew tree and decorated it with silver brads. I was so excited to use some of them as I have zillions and I cut the "legs" off of them so they'd sit nice and flat.

Saturday, November 7, 2015

Hi there! We're back with Day 2 of celebrating the newest release from Skipping Stones Design. As I mentioned yesterday, be sure to hop along and check out all the fantastic inspiration and leave comments as Heather (owner of SSD) will be giving away the entire release to a randomly drawn commenter!

You should have arrived here from the Skipping Stones Design blogbut if you got lost along the way here's the full list of blogs so you're sure not to miss anything:

Today's card is made with the Hippo Birthday set. How cute are these critters?? There are some adorable sheep in this set too along with plenty of punny sentiments. I went for a masculine feel with this card. I paper pieced the bird and hippo with solid colour cardstock and grounded them with a strip of patterned paper. There's lots of foam tape action going on here. Each animal is popped up on foam tape and their heads are also popped up separately which gives lots of fun dimension to the card.

Now it's time to hop along to Martha Lucia's blog and don't forget to leave comments for a chance to win!